BY MADDIE WELLS
In 2005, University of Baltimore School of Law Professor Barbara A. Babb and Senior Fellow Gloria H. Danziger saw the need for a different approach to chronic absenteeism among Baltimore City Public School students. Foregoing traditional punitive methods to treat students’ absences, they created what is now called the Tackling Chronic Absenteeism Project (TCAP)—formerly the Truancy Court Program, or TCP—to understand and treat underlying issues, foster long term academic success and strengthen ties between schools and the community.
As the TCAP team likes to say, addressing chronic absenteeism is like “peeling an onion.” A student’s low attendance rate is often just the first layer—a sign that children and their families are struggling with problems like bullying, an undiagnosed learning impairment, food insecurity, illness or substance use in the family, the loss of a parent or caregiver, housing instability or neighborhood violence.
For nearly 20 years, TCAP—part of the Sayra and Neil Meyerhoff Center for Families, Children and the Courts (CFCC) in the School of Law—has been busy peeling off these layers. Michele Hong-Polansky, CFCC Deputy Director, explains that “a lot of times little kids don’t realize they’re homeless; it doesn’t come out [until] they say they couldn’t fall asleep because the TV was really loud, [but then] we realize the kid was living on the couch in their aunt’s home because they’re homeless.” Once the TCAP team starts to understand the challenges a student is dealing with, they can connect students to the resources they need, such as transportation assistance, food or uniforms.
TCAP’s capacity to reach students has grown significantly over the years. When Babb and Danziger founded the program, it was a small, one-semester endeavor staffed with just two employees—a mentor and a coordinator. Now, TCAP operates in a handful of Baltimore City Public Schools each year and retains a coordinator, a case manager, a mentor and an attorney, as well as interns and tutors from the UBalt community. Each year, several practicing and retired judges familiar with the juvenile court system volunteer their time to serve as TCAP Judges. Since its inception, the program has served over 3,000 students and their families in approximately 58 schools across Maryland, including 40 in the city, as well as schools across Baltimore, Montgomery and Anne Arundel counties.
“ We hope that our efforts to strengthen the skills and relationships of students and their families will result in more Baltimore youth thriving without court-system involvement.”
AUBREY EDWARDS-LUCE
An entirely voluntary program, TCAP takes a holistic, nonpunitive and incentive-based approach, rooted in the principles of restorative justice, to reduce chronic absenteeism among Baltimore City elementary, middle and high school students. Through regular one-on-one meetings and restorative justice circles—guided by the principles of communication and repair, not punishment—the staff get to know students’ stories, struggles and strengths. The bonds often last well after a student’s graduation from the program: TCAP mentor Arion Alston still receives phone calls from students he worked with several years ago.
Because chronic absenteeism is linked to higher rates of interaction with the juvenile justice system, TCAP plays a vital role in disrupting the school-to-prison pipeline. Judges and attorneys for the program, many of whom are law school faculty, are critical to creating this transformation, offering rare face-to-face contact with the criminal justice system. (Students who have court cases are never paired with judges involved in their cases.) Current and former volunteer judges include notable figures such as Mark Friedenthal, a juvenile public defender, who has been with the program since its inception; Catherine (“Katie”) Curran O’Malley, J.D. ’91, the former First Lady of Maryland who until recently served as a Baltimore City District Court judge; David W. Young, a retired Baltimore Circuit Court judge and leader in juvenile justice reform; and Joyce T. Mitchell, J.D. ’79, a retired Magistrate in the Baltimore City Juvenile Court.
Attorney David Fishkin, a former public defender with Maryland Office of the Public Defender (OPD), begins his TCAP checkins by “establishing rapport with a student, trying to understand what’s in the way, what they’re excited about, [and] what they’re interested in.” From there, Fishkin works with students to strategize and identify “action steps” to achieve their goals. “The purpose of using actual judges,” said Alston, is to help students see “that somebody in [a position of authority is] on your side [and] wants to help you out.”
Students’ and caretakers’ relationships with attorneys frequently prove to be invaluable to students’ success. In one particularly memorable case, Fishkin was able to help a family of nine children experiencing multiple crises, including wrongful eviction and incarceration. TCAP stepped in to help when the father of the family was detained on old warrants for failure to appear in court during the COVID-19 pandemic. When OPD failed to request bail for the father, Fishkin was able to get an OPD supervising attorney to intervene, resulting in a bail review and the father’s release from prison. Unsurprisingly, the children’s attendance rates improved dramatically afterwards.
But solving chronic absenteeism looks different for each student. Christopher Kelly, B.S. ’18, M.S. ’22, TCAP case manager, recalls working with a high schooler who was on track to drop out of school. To understand their situation, Kelly conducted frequent home visits, meeting with not only the student but also their mother. In the process, he discovered there was a loss in the family that had created severe anxiety for the student. After receiving the support they needed, the student began coming to school every day and even received an award for their improved academic performance. Sometimes the solution is much simpler. In one case, Rohina Zavala, J.D. ’21, TCAP coordinator, made a deal with a student: if they had perfect attendance for a week they would receive a pack of their favorite candy, watermelon Sour Patch Kids. Zavala delivered on her promise, and the student attended school every day since.
Beyond these individual victories is a much larger story of success, as evidenced by the data TCAP has collected over the years. Typically, between 70 and 75 percent of students graduate from the program, meaning that they have met important benchmarks for improvement. The response from parents and caregivers has been overwhelmingly positive, too: in surveys, they praise TCAP for improving their child’s self-confidence, giving their child a safe place to express themselves and supporting their children when they couldn’t.
TCAP’s impact on students, families and schools has not gone unnoticed, garnering both local and national attention, from being honored as a Bright Idea by the Ash Center for Democratic Governance at the John F. Kennedy School of Government, Harvard University, to a recent feature on WYPR’s On The Record. Two Baltimore-based organizations, the Charles Crane Family Foundation and the Abell Foundation, have been especially committed to TCAP’s work, having given to the program for 22 years and four years, respectively. Their generous support helps to cover essential expenses that keep kids in school— from an Uber ride to a doctor’s appointment to a night at a hotel to keep a family off the street—as well as staff salaries and stipends as the program has grown.
As TCAP looks forward to its 20th anniversary in 2025, the team is continuing to refine its strategy under the new leadership of CFCC Executive Director, Aubrey Edwards-Luce. In coming years, TCAP will focus its efforts on middle schools, helping students to develop good habits earlier through more robust mentorship and family engagement as well as supporting families through the School Choice process. Edwards- Luce explains, “We hope that our efforts to strengthen the skills and relationships of students and their families will result in more Baltimore youth thriving without court-system involvement.”
While chronic absenteeism may remain a challenge in years to come, TCAP is showing us how we can build a brighter future for our students, one layer at a time.
